Laumeier Sculpture Park: Saturday, 27 October 2012
Juan William Chávez expands his project, Living Proposal: Pruitt-Igoe Bee Sanctuary 2010-2012, during the 2012 Kranzberg Exhibition Series, on view in both the indoor and outdoor galleries of Laumeier Sculpture Park, Saturday, Oct. 27, 2012 through Sunday, Jan. 20, 2013. The outdoor exhibition features an outlined footprint of three buildings from the infamous Pruitt-Igoe complex created from string and wood posts. Inside Laumeier’s galleries, Chávez presents 17 works, including a lone jar of honey harvested from the Living Proposal site in North St. Louis, bee suits, videos and ephemera documenting this project to date, which explores and highlights creative initiatives to address public issues surrounding the land where the Pruitt-Igoe housing project once stood in St. Louis.
Juan William Chávez created the Pruitt-Igoe Bee Sanctuary to encourage public dialogue about the creative uses and possibilities of revitalizing abandoned urban landscape by confronting history and addressing community issues. He began documenting the Pruitt-Igoe site through photography and asking questions about its history in 2010. The driving question became, “After the housing project failed, what community could live there?” As nature has taken over the location, Chávez realizes that what once was Pruitt-Igoe, is now a natural sanctuary for bees, which are currently suffering a colony collapse.
Chávez created and installed a temporary site-specific sculpture comprising bee hives with wax and bee pheromones on the site and documented the changes that took place thereafter.
Other works on view at Laumeier are related to Chávez’s summer 2011 research trip to Europe, where he toured The Beekeeping School (Le Rucher École) in the Luxembourg Gardens of Paris and cave drawings near Valencia, Spain, which are the oldest known recorded example of the human/bee relationship. The video titled Luxembourg Conversation, 2012, screened in our indoor galleries, combines this research and an interview with educator Wilfried Segue, during which he discusses the nuances of public space as it relates and compares to his teaching experiences in St. Louis and Paris.
Events related to the exhibition include:
Opening Reception and Gallery Talk—Saturday, Oct. 27; 5—7 p.m.
Campfire Chat with the Artist—Saturday, Nov. 17; 1 p.m.
Roundtable Discussion—Saturday, Jan. 12; 1 p.m.
Juan William Chávez created the Pruitt-Igoe Bee Sanctuary to encourage public dialogue about the creative uses and possibilities of revitalizing abandoned urban landscape by confronting history and addressing community issues. He began documenting the Pruitt-Igoe site through photography and asking questions about its history in 2010. The driving question became, “After the housing project failed, what community could live there?” As nature has taken over the location, Chávez realizes that what once was Pruitt-Igoe, is now a natural sanctuary for bees, which are currently suffering a colony collapse.
Chávez created and installed a temporary site-specific sculpture comprising bee hives with wax and bee pheromones on the site and documented the changes that took place thereafter.
Other works on view at Laumeier are related to Chávez’s summer 2011 research trip to Europe, where he toured The Beekeeping School (Le Rucher École) in the Luxembourg Gardens of Paris and cave drawings near Valencia, Spain, which are the oldest known recorded example of the human/bee relationship. The video titled Luxembourg Conversation, 2012, screened in our indoor galleries, combines this research and an interview with educator Wilfried Segue, during which he discusses the nuances of public space as it relates and compares to his teaching experiences in St. Louis and Paris.
Events related to the exhibition include:
Opening Reception and Gallery Talk—Saturday, Oct. 27; 5—7 p.m.
Campfire Chat with the Artist—Saturday, Nov. 17; 1 p.m.
Roundtable Discussion—Saturday, Jan. 12; 1 p.m.
posted by Bill Barrett at 2:42 PM
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